The nuclear scientists were killed using a special weapon whose details were barred from publication, Channel 12 says.
The 10th nuclear scientist was killed shortly after the other nine, as part of the overnight Thursday-Friday Israeli operation, which included strikes on Iran’s ballistic missile program and the Natanz nuclear site, along with the elimination of top members of the Islamic Republic’s military leadership, the network says.
The nuclear scientists were all killed while they were sleeping in their beds, with Israel deciding to carry out the assassinations simultaneously so that there wouldn’t be time to tip off those being targeted.
The scientists apparently believed they were safe from such targeting in their homes, a senior Israeli official tells Channel 12, noting that previously assassinated nuclear scientists were killed while heading to their cars after work.
Israel had been tracking Iranian nuclear scientists for years and the ten killed last week were marked for assassination in November of last year, Channel 12 says.
Just when I feel like dystopian news can’t really disturb me anymore…
Leaving this totally unrelated article about Palantir and Israel here for absolutely no reason at all…
How Israel Uses AI in Gaza—And What It Might Mean for the Future of Warfare:
A program known as “The Gospel” generates suggestions for buildings and structures militants may be operating in. “Lavender” is programmed to identify suspected members of Hamas and other armed groups for assassination, from commanders all the way down to foot soldiers. “Where’s Daddy?” reportedly follows their movements by tracking their phones in order to target them—often to their homes, where their presence is regarded as confirmation of their identity. The air strike that follows might kill everyone in the target’s family, if not everyone in the apartment building.
Abraham, whose report relies on conversations with six Israeli intelligence officers with first-hand experience in Gaza operations after Oct. 7, quoted targeting officers as saying they found themselves deferring to the Lavender program, despite knowing that it produces incorrect targeting suggestions in roughly 10% of cases.
I’m surprised they’re publicly announcing this one.
I think it’s probably pretty hard to keep simultaneously assassinating 10 targets and their families under wraps, so they’re trying to get ahead of accusations by pretending it’s a show of military strength instead of horrifying skynet murder.
It looks especially bad when they’re pointing the finger at Iran for fucking cluster bombs.
The argument being cluster bombs are a dirty move, but using simultaneous AI powered assassin drones to strike while people are sleeping makes you the good guys?
I mean… That is how this works. Cluster bombs are bad because they’re less precise and cause more collateral damage. So weapons that target individuals with high precision are better
But like… Presumably, you’re not just individually killing a bunch of civilians precisely
No, they’re not precise at all unless you consider also killing their families and potentially an entire building full of people to be acceptable “precision.”
That’s why it seems like bullshit to pretend lower tech cluster bombs are an inexcusable evil compared to Palantir AI drones.
But that’s it exactly - cluster bombs just fling granades all over a city block at random. It’s basically just collateral damage in the hopes of hitting a soft target
I mean, fuck palantir and I really don’t like this tech in general, but blowing up a room or a house is way more precise. You’re hitting just what you mean to hit
And that’s what a lot of war crimes come down to - certain weapons are unacceptably imprecise. Which gets into the first rule of war crimes - you’re not supposed to attack noncombatants
Let’s not defend cluster bombs just because Israel is going to use this for justification…
Because of course they will, this whole thing started by blowing up the Iranian negotiator, they’re obviously not going to start acting in good faith now
That gave me the mental image of an Age of Empires 2 mangonel.
They are more precise than cluster bombs.